Dead Centre (36 page)

I started to get out of the aircraft.

‘Yep, mate, it’s all good. I want to come with you, and these lads are going to stay here with the money, all right?’

He was already on his way to the technicals. I leant back into the aircraft once I had both feet on the tarmac. ‘Listen in, lads. The deal is, I have ten minutes with the two Georgians, or whoever the fuck they are. But I don’t want to be on the ground any longer than we need to. What do you reckon?’

I looked at the ones who understood English. They nodded.

‘We fuck off the moment everybody’s on board. I’m not sure what these fuckers are going to do. They might still try to take us, and go for another round of cash. It would certainly cross my mind.

‘But I’ve got places to go as soon as this shit is over. I need to get away as fast as I can. So I’m now going down to the technicals. I’ll collect the two white guys and grip ’em. At the same time, the others should be coming back to you. Then we just get the fuck out of here – agreed?’

Joe didn’t take long to cast his vote. ‘Fucking A, man.’

Mr Lover Man translated. He and Genghis both gave it the nod. ‘What if they don’t speak English? What are you going to do then?’

‘I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.’

Awaale had climbed back onto the flatbed. He was standing beside the 12.7. ‘Mr Nick, come, come!’ He had to shout to make himself heard above the music.

I ran over and climbed on board. I stood the other side of the cannon and held on to it for support.

Erasto’s technical stayed where it was. Smoke still billowed out of the rear windows.

We headed off down the runway, music blaring, lights on full beam. The blast of air was just what I needed. I was fucked. Awaale was grinning like a psychopath as he checked the cash was still secure under his shirt. ‘We’re nearly there, Mr Nick. One day you will come to Minneapolis and visit my father. I’ll come too. I’ll call you, yes?’

‘Yep, that would be great, mate.’

He was a good lad, but I didn’t plan to get mixed up with the guy who’d shot down the Black Hawk any time soon. That was, if the legend was true, of course. Every man and his Somali dog would want to claim that hit.

‘Awaale, mate. Bring the two white guys up first.’ I had to shout into the wind. ‘They are there, aren’t they?’

His eyes rolled as if I’d asked yet another stupid question.

‘Good. I want to get them in this wagon for the drive back. The rest can follow. Just make sure you get those two white guys in here first.’

‘No problem, Mr Nick. I want them in the back with us, too. I’ll be the one to hand them over to Erasto. It will be a great moment for me. What do you think? Do you think it will be great for me?’

‘I think it’ll be absolutely fucking brilliant. After all, everybody loves you now, don’t they?’

‘Yes, they do, Mr Nick –
they do
!’

He sank down behind the cab to make the call. Tracy and me, we’d have the gratitude-fest on the plane to Malindi. For now, I still had work to do.

16

WE STOPPED AT the end of the runway and I jumped off the wagon. Music blasted. Awaale shouted into his mobile and gave noisy high-fives to anyone within reach. The wagon’s crew were still yelling at each other excitedly about the attack.

I hobbled away from them until all I could hear was the pounding surf. I got out the iPhone and dialled. I just got the mad Arab woman again. I tried Jules. Voicemail. But he’d left me a message.

‘She’s OK. The Brits are sending a warship, the
Cumberland
, to Benghazi to evac UK nationals. No idea when it will get there but I’m trying to get her on board and out of the city soon as. Stand by.’

‘Mr Nick, they’re here, they’re here! Mr Nick, they’re here!’

I turned back. Awaale jumped off the wagon. Ant and Dec were being frogmarched along the edge of the tarmac. Awaale yelled, and they were steered towards the back of our technical.

I joined them as fast as I could. Fuck, my feet were sore. ‘Mate, let’s get them on board and take them down to the sea, yeah?’ If these lads understood English, I wanted them to think the worst. ‘Off the runway, down by the rocks.’

Ant and Dec sat against the back of the cab, their arses on the flatbed. There was no fear in their eyes. They accepted they were about to die. Once that happens, it’s like a massive weight being lifted. Every minute you’re still alive becomes a bonus.

The wagon lurched along the strip. My arm hooked round the 12.7 stand for stability, I squatted in front of them. Their heads lolled with the motion of the vehicle. The runway lights became like strobes as we sped past them.

‘You two,’ I shouted above the engine noise. ‘You speak English?’ I jabbed their chests hard. I wanted to be sure they knew the score.

They looked back at me through bloodshot eyes. Both had growth on their chins, and hair on end after hours at sea. I probably looked exactly the same.

I made eye-to-eye with each of them in turn. I wanted to make sure they recognized me. I wanted to see if there was any reaction.

‘OK – if you understand me or not, I don’t give a shit. But these lads here, they want you bad. The guy you killed in Bristol? Their boss’s brother. And you killed a woman. The woman you were with in the AS compound? That was her sister. Both of you have fucked up big-time.’

There was a glimmer of understanding in their eyes. These fuckers knew exactly what I was talking about.

We bounced off the tarmac. Their heads bounced left and right as the wagon negotiated the rubble-strewn terrain.

‘So, lads – you’ve got to tell me where you come from, who you work for. I’ll see what I can do for you. Otherwise, you’re fucked. They’ll make sure it ain’t quick, believe me.’

I kept eye-to-eye, switching between them, making sure they took every word on board.

We juddered to a standstill.

The surf pounded against the rocks below us.

All I got from them was the same look Mr Lover Man and Genghis had given Awaale in the back of Joe’s Cessna.

The other technical passed us on the runway, packed with bodies. Tracy was wrapped around Stefan. BB stood behind the cab, one hand gripping the 12.7.

I had to get this bit done quickly.

I stood up.

‘OK, then, fuck you.’

I jumped over the side.

‘Awaale, let’s get them on the ground and stripped. Get their kit off.’

He issued a string of orders. I heard ‘Erasto’ a couple of times. The crew’s reaction was to kick and slap the two Georgians off the back of the wagon.

They fell into the dust. Even the driver jumped out to help deliver the message. The Somali boys pulled off the Georgians’ jeans and shirts and tugged at their boots.

‘I want them stripped totally. Everything off.’

Awaale and his mates laid into them like a pack of wild dogs attacking two antelope. Ant and Dec tried to curl up in the cloud of dust that billowed up around them.

17

I LET THEM get on with it for a couple of minutes.

‘All right, let’s have a look at them.’

Awaale didn’t answer. He was somewhere in the mêlée.

I moved forward. They carried on slapping, punching, raining down rifle butts.

‘Awaale, where the fuck are you?’

No reply.

‘
Awaale!
’

He emerged out of the darkness. A layer of dust clung to his sweat-covered face.

‘Enough, mate. You’re handing them over to Erasto, remember?’

His eyes were glazed, as if he was drunk or high.

‘Awaale, come on, mate, switch on.’

Behind him, the crew kept pounding into Ant and Dec. These lads really did have a different mindset.

I grabbed Awaale’s arms. ‘Get them to stop. I want these fuckers alive. You’re the main man, remember? You’ve got to step back from this shit and see the bigger picture. Awaale? You listening to me?’

He showed signs of rejoining Planet Earth. His eyes started to focus. ‘Yes, yes, of course, Mr Nick. Of course.’

He turned and re-entered the dust cloud, gobbing off as he went. He pushed and pulled the crew off the wounded animals. He had to slap a couple of the boys to make them get out of the way, bollocking them as if he’d had nothing to do with it.

Ant and Dec’s grazed and soon-to-be badly bruised bodies were curled up into balls. They looked as though someone had set about them with a cheese-grater.

They coughed and spluttered into the dust. Their tattoos glistened with blood and sweat. They were the normal snakes-wrapped-around-daggers stuff. Plus a couple of tribal tats, all that shit. It was the ones that had writing round them that I was interested in. Ant’s was a mermaid with tits. Dec’s was a fox. The writing beneath them looked like a row of twisted paperclips, like some sort of elaborate Far Eastern script. But having done some stuff in the Tbilisi neighbourhood, I knew exactly what it was. It was Mkhedruli, the Georgian alphabet.

I still had no boots on. My Timberlands had stayed behind in the AS compound, along with my day sack. But I kicked into them anyway. I wanted to get their attention.

‘Who sent you?’

Nothing.

‘If you don’t help me, these lads will keep on going until you do.’

Ant spat a mixture of saliva and blood into the dust, and maybe a couple of teeth as well. ‘Fuck you. Fuck all you
bitches
.’

Dec had a mouthful of the same, but he aimed it at me. It sprayed across the calf of my jeans. I turned back to the vehicle. Awaale was looking down the runway. I slapped him on the shoulder.

‘You OK, mate?’

He turned. ‘Yes, Mr Nick. I must control myself. I’m a leader now, the main man, yes?’

‘That’s right, mate. You must be able to turn that shit off – keep a clear head when it’s decision time.’

He nodded. ‘Yes, Mr Nick. Thank you. Yes, I will. I will.’

‘All right. Let’s get these fuckers back on the wagon. I’m done.’

I’d learnt enough. Now the other technical was at the aircraft, we needed to move.

I watched Awaale get the crew sorted. They dragged Ant and Dec to the flatbed and threw them onboard. We jumped up behind them. The driver ground the gears and we lurched off towards a quick exit out of there.

18

BACK AT THE terminal, Mr Lover Man and Genghis weren’t giving Erasto time to think about what he might do next. They were both out of the Cessna with a bag over one shoulder, weapons up.

Mr Lover Man was shouting. Whatever it was about, it meant nothing to the crews around the two technicals. They looked jumpy and brandished their weapons left, right and centre. One lad even brought his RPG into the aim. Another swung the 12.7 on its mount.

Tracy and Stefan were waiting forward of Erasto’s wagon, just off to the right, twenty metres or so from the aircraft.

This was the bit I fucking hated on these jobs. In all the excitement, just one trigger-finger exerting a tad too much pressure was all it took to fuck the whole thing up.

BB shouted back at Mr Lover Man, like they were in some kind of
High Noon
stand-off.

We came to a halt behind Erasto’s technical. BB was still bawling out Mr Lover Man. Now I could hear him. ‘They don’t fucking speak English, you twat! Just give them the cash – give them the fucking cash
now
.’

Mr Lover Man and Genghis stood their ground, M4s still in the shoulder. These guys were chilled. Their expressions hadn’t changed the whole time I’d known them.

Now we were closer, I could see the wires snaking out of the bags. Each of Frank’s boys had the bottom three fingers of his pistol hand through the ring-pulls, with his trigger-finger free. They were ready to drop the bag and pull, then take casualties before they became one.

Joe was still in the left-hand seat. The electrics started to wind up, blanketing the area with their high-pitched whine.

Mr Lover Man’s eyes never left the crews. They bounced from man to man, checking where their hands and weapons were. He shouted loudly over the engine noise: ‘Put down your weapons!’ The crews screamed back and did nothing, still off their tits.

Genghis and Mr Lover Man stood their ground, one each side of the cargo-hold doors. Mr Lover Man spotted me. ‘Get the money-counter to tell them to stand down. We’ll all get onto the plane. We’ll throw the cash out as we taxi. No hostages, no deal. Tell him.’

BB’s head swung between us as he took all this in. It was only as he turned back to me that I noticed he now had Stefan. ‘We take the Georgians with us. We can’t leave them with these fucking animals.’

I stared back at him. I’d had enough of this fucker already. ‘Shut the fuck up or I’ll get one of these animals to stick a fucking rifle butt in your face. Shut it. Everyone fucking – calm – down …’

Awaale was at Erasto’s window. I walked over to him. The boss man was sitting precisely where I’d last seen him, not showing the slightest concern as he sparked up his two-hundredth Marlboro of the day.

‘Awaale, tell Erasto we have the two white guys for him. Tell him that we’ll now do the one-for-one swap. The money comes to him as the hostages come to us, OK? And then he can have the two lads in the back, and do with them what he feels like. Tell him that.’

‘No problem, Mr Nick. We’ve done this many, many times. You know, you must tell your guys to cool it.’

‘Mate, they’re not my guys, so that ain’t going to happen, is it? Tell Erasto that as soon as he gets the money he leaves with his crew. Tell him he’s to take two technicals with him, which just leaves your wagon, the two white guys, and your lads looking after them. All right? So that means everything’s calm, everything’s good, we can all relax, and you can make sure we get away. But right now, let’s all keep fingers off triggers, yeah?’

Awaale turned away from the window. ‘OK, Mr Nick.’ He gave it the full John Wayne. ‘
Let’s do it
.’

As I followed him towards the Cessna, Awaale started chatting like we were off to the pub for a pint. ‘So, I’ll give you my father’s number. We’ll all meet up in Minneapolis.’ He leant towards me and went back into conspiratorial mode. ‘Once I have taken over the clan I will then visit my father and tell him to come home. But, first, you’ll join us in Minneapolis, won’t you?’